Memories and Thoughts of Interrupted Sleep
by Barsonia
Summary: Sometimes, the quiet atmosphere of the late night is when the brain is most active. Modern-day, AU one-shot.


She awoke to the glow of the television. It was all that prevented the living room from being engulfed in complete darkness. Her blurry eyes adjusted, and she saw that static was all that was shown on the TV. The station was on standby, most likely.

Elsa flicked the strands of hair out of her face. It would seem that there were downsides to having long, flowing hair after all. In a still half-asleep daze, she tried to summon the memory of why she was here, sleeping on the couch, instead of the obviously superior bed in her room. Her eyes darted around the room, and finally landed on the sleeping (and quietly snoring) figure on the floor, with a blanket draped around her form and a pillow elevating her head. It all came back to Elsa, then.

_Anna. _

Of course. They had stayed up late chatting and watching movies. It was still dark, so they probably hadn't been asleep for very long. Every once in a blue moon or so the sisters would have a night like this. Their occurrences would happen less and less often as the years went by, ostensibly due to them drifting apart and finding other friends and comforts, though Elsa would be lying to herself if she didn't admit that Anna was the one that had done most of the drifting. Granted, she probably hadn't helped the situation with her increasing isolation and asocial behavior. Despite her attempts to ignore it, there was a distinct and unavoidable feeling of hurt in Elsa at the very idea of her sister not needing her as much as she used to.

When they were children, Elsa had always been protective and nurturing of her sister. She helped her get over the nervousness of the first day of school. She soothed her when she got a scraped knee or a blister. She was there for her. Always. It even made her think back to one particular incident, her brain recalling it in vivid detail.

"_Elsa, I don't wanna! This is stupid!" The six year old pouted, her face contorted into a mixture of pure frustration, though it wasn't exactly the most intimidating sight in the world. Elsa smirked and could barely hold back a giggle, as she rolled her eyes at her younger sibling's resolve. If the older was merely doing this of her own volition, she would have given up at Anna's seemingly unchangeable stance quite a while ago. But, there was an incentive. Her father had tasked her with teaching the younger sibling to ride a bike before he got home from work, and even promised to take her for ice cream if she succeeded. No, by gosh, she was going to teach that stubborn little brat to ride a bike even if it killed her!_

"_Come on, Anna, don't be so dramatic. All your friends can ride their bikes! Do you really want to miss out on doing all of those fun things with them?" Elsa asked, figuring that she would attempt the tried and tested method of pure pressure._

_Anna simply nodded her head in the affirmative at the rhetorical question, with the heavily exaggerated and not slightly adorable frown on her face not weakening even for a second. Elsa dropped her face into both of her hands, her patience becoming more worn by the second. After pondering for a moment, she decided to try a different approach._

"_But...what about me? I can ride **my **bike! How are we supposed to go to all of those cool and exciting places if you can't ride yours?" She asked in a tone laced with false enthusiasm._

_This caused Anna's facial features to temporarily drop, and her assertive stance partially faded with a subtlety that only a sister could notice. "W-what kind of places would we go? I mean, not that I care or nothing, since I won't do it!" She said, trying (and failing) to seem cool and detached from the conversation._

_Elsa threw her arms up with a flair of extravagance. "Are you **kidding**?! Anna, we'd go **everywhere**! The park, the movies, Paris, you name it! Why, the whole world would be our oyster if you could ride your bike! We'd go anywhere and everywhere; the sky would be our limit, and maybe not even that could hold us back!" She said, her tone remaining completely energetic throughout the entire speech._

_Anna's frown had all but disappeared at this point, and her posture had weakened considerably. "W-well, maybe it wouldn't hurt to try. You know, just to see what all the fuss is about, I mean."_

"_That's the spirit!" Elsa spoke, with her joy not being even remotely faked or contrived in any way, shape, or form. It looked like she was only a little time away from getting the sweet, sweet ice cream that she so desperately craved. Elsa helped Anna onto the bike seat, and then kept the bicycle steady for her. However, Elsa's grin faded when she realized that her sister's eyes were sealed shut and she was shaking like a leaf. So, that's why she was so resistant about learning how to do this._

_Elsa put a comforting hand on Anna's shoulder. "Hey, relax. The way you master everything else, you'll be a champ at this in no time!" The younger simply gave a small smile in return, and then Elsa began to push._

…

_Their father pulled into the driveway. He'd had a long and stressful day at work, and was looking forward to unwinding and maybe watching a little TV or taking a nap. As he exited the car, however, what he saw nearly made his eyes jump out of their sockets._

_Anna was zooming up and down the street on her bicycle at nearly supersonic speeds, laughing uncontrollably as the wind blew her red hair back in a swirling vortex of absurdity. Her older sister followed at a considerable distance on her own bike, cheering the younger on all the time. When they noticed their father had made it home, however, both of them screeched to a halt in front of him, still standing with an expression that could only begin to be described as "shell-shocked"._

_Anna waved ecstatically at her father with massive smile that stretched to the very edges of both sides of her face as she panted like a dog that had just run a million miles. "Hi, Daddy! Pretty neat, huh?!"_

_Elsa was smiling too, though her's was far more devious than her innocent sister's. "So, Dad, ice cream's sounding pretty good right now, isn't it?"_

Elsa smiled at the distant memory, and then slowly her smile went away, and she sighed. Those sure were the days.

Then, the drifting started, sometime around Anna beginning high school. Elsa knew she would make new friends and even have boyfriends, and she was genuinely happy for her, but she never thought that other people would ever come to replace her in Anna's life. She had always been there for her sister; she never thought she'd have to worry about the opposite scenario.

But, none of that mattered at that moment. Because, as she rested her head on her elbow, and watched the gently inhaling and exhaling of her sleeping sister, Elsa felt a sense of inner peace that not even every bad memory she'd ever had (and there were quite a few) could disturb. Reaching her arm down, she brushed Anna's hair softly, and then kissed her on the forehead.

"Good night, sis. Sweet dreams," she whispered quietly, careful not to wake her.

She had no misconceptions about the future. She knew that the drifting could only continue from where it was, and soon the bond between the sisters would be a fragment of what it once was, if that.

But, that didn't mean that she couldn't enjoy it while it lasted.


End file.
